Pharmas Report Initial Successes with New Heart Disease Biotherapy

A physician and biotechnology investor, Lindsay Rosenwald has helped to fund drugs for leukemia and prostate cancer. Today, Lindsay Rosenwald co-manages a New York City asset management firm that focuses on medical innovation.

Over the last decade, researchers have made a series of major discoveries that have given pharmaceutical and biotechnology firms a better understanding of the biological causes of high cholesterol. Due to this extraordinary research, which showed that various mutations of a gene called PCSK9 dramatically affect low-density lipoprotein (LDL) cholesterol levels, drug developers have begun a race for what could be a cure for heart disease.

Currently, pharmaceutical giants Amgen Inc., Pfizer Inc., and Sanofi each have drugs in clinical trials. Comprised of monoclonal antibodies derived from living cells, these new therapies mimic the effects of the mutated PCSK9 gene. Patients currently participating in the clinical trials have responded well to the injected drug, demonstrating drastically lower LDL levels. Although the drugs will not likely receive approval from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration for several years, Amgen has already built three facilities to produce its cholesterol drug once it is ready for market.